Stuart Lawson (HSBC Russia): "If I Can Look in the Eyes of my Ten-year-old Son When I Have Finished My Day at Work and Be Proud of What I’ve Done, than That’s Ok by Me"
Stuart Lawson, CEO of HSBC Russia, believes that it is important to be able to pass on your set of standards to the future generation and that you have to understand in life where you should draw that line for yourself that you shouldn't cross.
1. What can you say about values that you share in life or within your organization?
I have a very simple test: if I can look in the eyes of my ten-year-old son, when I have finished my day at work, if I can look in his eyes and be proud of what I've done than that's ok by me. Everybody has to have their own set of standards, and I'm trying to teach him the standards that I have, because, actually, I think all of this is only what you've passed on. A friend of mine gave me a mug when I left Russia the first time, in fact it was the same guy who hired me back to Russia but he didn't know that at the time. He gave the mug in 97, I still got it, and it says something along the lines of "in a hundred years it won't matter if you had a big car, how many houses and how much money you had, but what will matter is if you were important in the life of a child". That was just around the time when my son was about to be born. So, for me, I find this thing about passing on: you know, we go through life, we have all these experiences and than you have to pass it on, and you can pass it on to your kids or you can pass it on to your colleagues, but you need to pass it on. I teach at Emory Business School, but only once a quarter, and it's basically allow me to be in States to see my son, but it's very important to me that I'm able to communicate, because I think that after you've had this opportunity, it is our duty to pass on what we've learnt in life, in our working life, in our personal life to another generation.
2. How do you pass this vision to your employees?
I have said this to my staff more than once: integrity is a very fragile plant, you water it every day, you place it in a good place and every day it grows but only if you water it, only if you pay attention to it and only if you care passionately about it. Integrity isn't something you sort of do, it's not something you can do part time, you either have it or you don't have it and you can lose your integrity in a minute. You have to understand in life where are you drawing that line for yourself and, obviously, we all get faced with difficult gray decisions where the world doesn't turn up and say: is this a good idea and a bad idea - choose one. It says here is an idea, it's a bit of this and a bit of that, now choose it. You have to have this internal gyroscope that always knows which way is up, and only you can spin the cord that creates the momentum that allows you to know which way is up. Be aware that in desperate times decent men do desperate deeds. The time you are the most tested is not on a sunny day in the beach on the south of France, it's in the middle of a crisis and the weather is bad and you are tired, and wouldn't it be easier to say "yes". It's always easier to say "yes". So, sometimes it's necessary to say "no", because it's the right thing to do. Sometimes you should have to say "yes", because it's the right thing to do, but not under this pressure that builds a commercial interest often.
3. Can you give an example?
You know, I get dozen of these a day, where there are people that want to do something and you have to decide whether you should do it or not and you have to refer these things to your internal judgment, and it's not negotiable. One of the things about integrity is it's not a part time hobby and it's not negotiable. It's not something where you can say, "well, if you pay a million dollars than I'll do it". The point about integrity is it is not for sale, it is not negotiable and it is not part time.
4. How can you encourage the right behavior?
Let's analyze it. First of all, these old guys that are talking about integrity, if they'd really had it, will young guys want. Youth is not excuse. You have to establish, day one, I suppose, or early on, what's more important for you. If somebody says to you, you can make a lot of money but are going to have to lie and cheat and do all these things, you have to make your own decision. I'm only describing what my view of what it takes to be a leader, there's plenty of other views. You just have to be the most ruthless to be the leader and take a war. In a war it's about who kills the most people, now in a bnp's that isn't really something that people trying advertise. But in a war all those qualities and there are leadership qualities too, and that's when the integrity is at most risk. But terrible things are done and how do you a terrible thing with integrity?
5. Can you illustrate it with an example?
I have a friend who is a doctor; she is an intensive care unit doctor at a liver and heart hospital, transplant hospital. She gets paid twenty-eight thousand rubles a month, today. So, when people come to me and they whine about their bonuses and why we're cutting their bonuses, I tell them that story. In fact, I used to have my original letter of acceptance from Citibank dated 1975. I was paid two thousand four hundred pounds a year. And as I try to tell the youngsters, you can double that salary it doesn't mean anything, life is a long game and you have to decide how you want to play it. And if you want to play it just based on money, understand that's what your life is and be a piece for that. If that's the most important thing to you that's what it is - the most important thing to you. I would simply say, temptation is going to be everywhere. It's there all the time for everybody. Don't let it get to you. There are no shortcuts. You see, this is what an old guy says, because it worked for me. It's not necessarily going to work for everybody else, but I would say there are no real shortcuts in life. I have a saying: if a deal is too good to be true - it is too good to be true. So, if a deal is too good to be true, it normally is. So, if life is too simple and success is too quick there is normally a price to pay.
6. What can you say about ninetieth vs. thousands?
In the ninetieth, we westerners came and talk down to the Russians. It was the wrong thing to do, and it saw the seeds of arrogance within Russian managers, I'm afraid. Because, once Russia got its hands on these real revenues and energy exports, it was able to stand tall, and, actually, as the West started to going into this crisis, it took the position "it's your fault - nothing to do with us, we know what we're doing, look at us we've been terribly successful ". And a problem in the genesis of that was in the bad habits that the western managers had used with Russia in the 90th. I think, if we'd been more consensual, if we'd listen more, if we'd understood how different Russia is to other parts of the world, if we'd respect the managers that were here, I think, that there wouldn't be this reaction in the thousands. But, we are where we are. Now it's critical. There is this free dialog and what worries me as I look into some of situations that are developing is that I am concerned that barriers are going up rather than barriers are coming down. I worry about that because now it's more important than ever that we have a free dialog, very open dialog.
7. What do you think about life in Russia?
I think there are three stages of expatriates in Russia. The first is, you get off the plain, it's November or December, it's extremely cold, and there is snow. You look up and there is this funny letters and you know you are in a strange place, and you're probably a bit horrified. Everything is kind of scary. That's the first stage. Than there is a second stage, which is you've been here for two years or three years, you can say some words in Russian. You are now much more comfortable. And that is dangerous, because at that point, two years in or three years in, that as an expatriate you think you understand what's going on. Of course, you haven't got a clue. What's going on is very Russian and you need more time, you need deeper understanding to really have an idea of what's going on. And than there is a final stage of grace which I think I'm in now because this is my twelfth year in Russia, it's a point in which you understand that you don't understand. You understand enough that you can understand areas where you have insight but there are other areas which, frankly, you will never fully understand. And that's, I think, a very valuable insight. One of the things that I would say to anybody coming to Russia is that Russia has a very deep set of traditions, has one of the best human resource basis of any country that I've worked and I worked in eleven. So, anywhere in the world and I include my own country, the UK, I think that the quality of the human capital here is at the very top end. But people are wiered differently. I found some of the things I do personally have now become a little bit Russian: if I forget something, I always look at the mirror when I pick it up or I would sit on my suitcases before I leave home or I never shake hands across the doorway. These are things that I now do completely naturally. But I reflect some of the superstition, mysticism that is around in Russia. As I said, I think it's a fantastic country to get to know but it's quite complex.
Prepared by Katia Barzova, Good2Work Intern, on December 3, 2008
